


Part I, Act II: I Could Be Good To You

by Browneyesparker



Series: Love Scenes [12]
Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Angst, Broadway, F/M, Friendship, Heather the Musicals, Jane & Lisbon, Seventeen - Freeform, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-25
Updated: 2015-03-25
Packaged: 2018-03-19 12:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3609561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Browneyesparker/pseuds/Browneyesparker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>The title comes from Seventeen, the song that inspired this story.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Part I, Act II: I Could Be Good To You

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from Seventeen, the song that inspired this story.

 

**.**

_“Can’t we be seventeen? That’s all I want to do, if you let me in, I could be good to you.”_

**Seventeen, the Heathers**

  
Lisbon found the gun hidden in his attic quite by accident. She knew just by looking at it what was going to happen if he had the opportunity to use it. She felt the bile rise to her throat and she swallowed hard as a dozen questions flitted through her mind like butterflies dancing on the breeze in the spring but he wasn’t there to answer them and she wasn’t sure that she wanted him to answer them, for him to catch her in what he could consider a personal sin against him by invading his personal space.

She hid it again, feeling like it had burned the palm of her hand.

She turned around and found him watching her, from the doorway. She swallowed again and squared her shoulders, preparing herself for a verbal berating. When none came, she found herself speaking first. Her voice sounded foreign to her own ears, the words coming out before she could stop them.

“What are you _thinking_?” She demanded as she strode towards him and stopped when they were only inches apart.

“I didn’t _buy_ it!” Jane answered defensively. “Somebody _gave_ it to me.”

“You kept it though!” Lisbon said. “You should have told me about it right away. Maybe. . . maybe, we could have talked about it.”

“What’s there to talk about?” Jane asked. “You know how I feel about the whole thing. You _know_ what I’m going to do if I have a choice. No amount of talking about it is going to change my mind.”

Lisbon released a deep breath and her shoulders slumped, like she was defeated. “I know. . .” she said, trailing off and sighing again. “I know how you feel but you’re _not_ the only one who’s lost people in your life, Jane. I have too. . . I am just as damaged as you are but it doesn’t give us a right to choose who lives or dies. It might not help, it might only make things worse.”

“That’s a chance I’ll have to take then,” Jane said.

Lisbon nodded. “Okay. I understand. I just wish. . . I wish—”

“What?” Jane asked, softening suddenly and reaching out to grab a hold of her elbows.

“It’s nothing,” Lisbon tried to assure him, to assure herself as she met his eyes and trying to guard her deepest secrets as he tried to read her.

He dropped his hands to his side, sighing himself. “Things are so complicated.”

“They don’t have to be,” Lisbon said, not believing it herself for one second. “At least they don’t have to be complicated _today_. . . look at me, Patrick. Just for today, we can pretend that everything’s okay. Just let me in, I’ll be good with you, I _promise_.”

“I-I-I can’t,” Jane answered. “Please don’t distract me, Lisbon. Not when I’m _so_ close to catching him.”

“How many times have you said _that_?” Lisbon asked, reaching out to touch his face.

He pulled away unintentionally, wincing like she had shocked him or something. “I really think I’m on to something this time though,” he replied, like there wasn’t an undercurrent of electricity between them.

Lisbon vaguely wondered how she had gone from scolding him about an unregistered gun and wanting to take the law into his own hands to wanting to kiss him and making him forget all about their troubles if just for a little while.

She felt as if they were running out of time.

Like she was about to lose him and there was nothing that she could do about it, not even by holding onto him too tightly, she didn’t think she was strong enough to try, she was already losing her grip on him. She could see the far off look in his eyes and she wasn’t sure that he would be with her in a month.

She wanted to be with him for what remaining time they had left. She knew it wouldn’t be in the way a man and a woman were usually together, but she didn’t care. Being his friend had always been good enough for her, she wouldn’t change her mind now even though she wanted so much more from him.

“Please. . .” Lisbon pleaded, knowing exactly how she sounded, desperate and needy, but she didn’t care, not if it would get him out of his head for just a while. “Come with me. . . just for a _little_ bit, we won’t talk about cases or Red John. It’ll just be the two of us, we can pretend we’re seventeen again.”

She didn’t know where the ridiculous suggestion had come from but now that it was out in the open, she knew that she couldn’t take it back.

“Seventeen wasn’t the best year of my life,” Jane told her.

“Me either,” Lisbon admitted, the idea took momentum in her mind. “That’s exactly why we should do it! We can do all the things we didn’t get to do when we were seventeen because we were taking care of our brothers or. . .”

“Trying to figure out how to leave our abusive father,” Jane added.

“Yes,” Lisbon agreed, she had faced the same dilemma too, until her father had killed himself and it had been one less thing to worry about even though it had caused her to grow up even faster than she already had been.

“Okay,” Jane answered, allowing her an allotted amount of time to pretend they were normal people, living normal lives.

Pretending they were teenagers again was probably as unconventional as their circumstances. But she didn’t care, they both needed a little bit of a reprieve from the lives that they were living. And she would take any way out, just for a little bit.

“Come on,” she whispered, too afraid to take his hand because she knew somebody in the bullpen or on the elevator would catch them.

He followed her automatically. . . obediently, like he didn’t really know what he was doing or why he was doing it. She wished she could read his thoughts, his body language as they walked together, but she could barely begin to untangle her own. Everything had stopped _really_ making sense five minutes ago, when she had found the gun.

When she had uncharacteristically suggested that they drop everything and pretend to be teenagers for a little bit. . . when he had begrudgingly agreed to indulge her and come along for a trip down memory lane, to recreate memories neither of them had ever really gotten a chance to make.

For now, it was almost enough.

**_The End_**

**.**

**Author's Note:**

> I forced myself to write this, in all honesty. I’ve had no desire to write anything lately, anxiety coupled with depression has not been my friend. I woke up this morning and decided to write at least 1,000 words because when I wanted to do it again, I didn’t want to be repressed. I am only telling this so you will forgive how all over the place this story is but also so you will know, I am okay with your honest opinion. Please leave it in the box below. I promise to post a cheerier story next time!
> 
> Until Then.


End file.
